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Heyzap (YC'09) is launching leader-boards on Android and iPhone. Still in alpha but we have some good results, you can check them out here: http://developers.h

by immad 14y ago

Heyzap (YC'09) is launching leader-boards on Android and iPhone. Still in alpha but we have some good results, you can check them out here: http://developers.heyzap.com/ http://developers.heyzap.com/ Unlike most other leader-board services everyone has a name and most people have a picture, so you don't see a lot of playerxxxxx scores, and we give you lots of ways of seeing/challenging your friends. If you have an Android you can try it out on: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.piratemonkeystudios.speedybiker&hl=en https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.piratemonk... You could roll your own, the benefit in using us is that a) its easy (< 1 hour). b) it allows you to leverage our user base. c) We are working aggressively to add new features like challenges Get in touch if you are interested or have any questions.

gwillen 14y ago
Question: What is your revenue model? What is your motivation not to go the way of the article we were all just reading, reminding us never to trust a platform because it will shut down and leave us with our thumbs up our asses?
- PythonDeveloper 14y ago
  I'm sure the guys at HeyZap are good people with the best of intentions, but the issue is that they can't predict the future. They can't tell you that their servers will be compromised, and all your users will be open game. They can't promise you that they won't bring in a CEO that just wants to get the company sold, and doesn't care about the developers or their customers. They can't tell you that when they pivot, all your games will be busted. Not because they're hiding this gem from you. It's simply because they don't know it. When you roll your own, you know it's going to survive because YOU are responsible for it. No BS politics are going to force you down an ridiculous migration path you don't already know about, and since YOU are the CEO, you can sell out and not worry about screwing companies who are dependent on your product or service. Even IF you choose to use a third party, you owe it to yourself to write your own and mirror that data on to yours so that when, not IF, they go down or out, you can flip a switch and you're back in business within seconds, not days. The deal with GREE stinks of potential currency manipulation, IMHO, and I wouldn't put my livelihood in their hands for one minute. Again, not because they're bad people - I don't know them from Adam, but because they've already shown that they're willing to allow the customer, we developers, to do ALL the work to satisfy THEIR migration to their API instead of requiring OpenFeint to develop a transparent proxy layer and make it turnkey. Don't indie developers have enough to do already?
- immad 14y ago
  People use Heyzap to install games, so its a pretty good opportunity to promote games to them. We have a sustainable business model and are not too far from profitable with 16 employees. We also have an API and will make it very easy for developers to download all the data if they ever want it. Openfeint is unfortunately not allowing that at all.
  - PythonDeveloper 14y ago
    Okay then, why can I scan all your user data without an account or any authentication? This URL: http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/search?q=mike http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/search?q=mike Allows me to anonymously see numerous (limited by # of results) users records. When I choose one from the list and go to this URL: http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/mike_midkiff/activity http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/mike_midkiff/activity I see all of Mike Midkiff's info. All the games he has, WHERE he played (are you f'in kidding me??????), HOW MUCH he paid, and even his unique ID. hackers, wake up. Bad engineering is bad. Only the developer whose game Mike bought should be able to request his information, and ONLY relative to that developers game. Hell. If someone gets mad at him in game, they can use YOUR API to track him down and beat the crap out of him. Nice.
    - immad 14y ago
      Mike has a public profile and his activity is public. Its like being able to read peoples public Tweets. Edit: Location is optional (based on user) and we only give city level with a truncated Lat/Long. Again this is the same as twitter/instagram etc.
    - PythonDeveloper 14y ago
      Just admit it's a bad implementation and commit to fix it. Except with Twitter and Instagram, I need to authenticate to get the information about WHERE an action occurred, so at least there's a trail. With your implementation, I can scan all my competitors users with public profiles (at the very least) and see who's buying what. If this is a transparency play, then say that and make a stink about it. But when Mike gets the crap kicked out of him, also step up and cover his medical bills. Edit: Okay.. so the location IS truncated, kudos. Why is this an unauthenticated API?

by immad 14y ago

gwillen 14y ago

Question: What is your revenue model? What is your motivation not to go the way of the article we were all just reading, reminding us never to trust a platform because it will shut down and leave us with our thumbs up our asses?

PythonDeveloper 14y ago
I'm sure the guys at HeyZap are good people with the best of intentions, but the issue is that they can't predict the future. They can't tell you that their servers will be compromised, and all your users will be open game. They can't promise you that they won't bring in a CEO that just wants to get the company sold, and doesn't care about the developers or their customers. They can't tell you that when they pivot, all your games will be busted. Not because they're hiding this gem from you. It's simply because they don't know it. When you roll your own, you know it's going to survive because YOU are responsible for it. No BS politics are going to force you down an ridiculous migration path you don't already know about, and since YOU are the CEO, you can sell out and not worry about screwing companies who are dependent on your product or service. Even IF you choose to use a third party, you owe it to yourself to write your own and mirror that data on to yours so that when, not IF, they go down or out, you can flip a switch and you're back in business within seconds, not days. The deal with GREE stinks of potential currency manipulation, IMHO, and I wouldn't put my livelihood in their hands for one minute. Again, not because they're bad people - I don't know them from Adam, but because they've already shown that they're willing to allow the customer, we developers, to do ALL the work to satisfy THEIR migration to their API instead of requiring OpenFeint to develop a transparent proxy layer and make it turnkey. Don't indie developers have enough to do already?
immad 14y ago
People use Heyzap to install games, so its a pretty good opportunity to promote games to them. We have a sustainable business model and are not too far from profitable with 16 employees. We also have an API and will make it very easy for developers to download all the data if they ever want it. Openfeint is unfortunately not allowing that at all.
- PythonDeveloper 14y ago
  Okay then, why can I scan all your user data without an account or any authentication? This URL: http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/search?q=mike http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/search?q=mike Allows me to anonymously see numerous (limited by # of results) users records. When I choose one from the list and go to this URL: http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/mike_midkiff/activity http://www.heyzap.com/api/v1/users/mike_midkiff/activity I see all of Mike Midkiff's info. All the games he has, WHERE he played (are you f'in kidding me??????), HOW MUCH he paid, and even his unique ID. hackers, wake up. Bad engineering is bad. Only the developer whose game Mike bought should be able to request his information, and ONLY relative to that developers game. Hell. If someone gets mad at him in game, they can use YOUR API to track him down and beat the crap out of him. Nice.
  - immad 14y ago
    Mike has a public profile and his activity is public. Its like being able to read peoples public Tweets. Edit: Location is optional (based on user) and we only give city level with a truncated Lat/Long. Again this is the same as twitter/instagram etc.
  - PythonDeveloper 14y ago
    Just admit it's a bad implementation and commit to fix it. Except with Twitter and Instagram, I need to authenticate to get the information about WHERE an action occurred, so at least there's a trail. With your implementation, I can scan all my competitors users with public profiles (at the very least) and see who's buying what. If this is a transparency play, then say that and make a stink about it. But when Mike gets the crap kicked out of him, also step up and cover his medical bills. Edit: Okay.. so the location IS truncated, kudos. Why is this an unauthenticated API?